


Can You Hear the Planet Sing?

by Gothams_Only_Wolf



Series: Battleship Cloud [7]
Category: Compilation of Final Fantasy VII, Crisis Core: Final Fantasy VII, Final Fantasy VII Remake (Video Game 2020)
Genre: 2020 FF7 Gaia Santa, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Everyone Lives/Nobody Dies, Cetra Headcanon, Cetra!Cloud, F/M, Not Canon Compliant, One-Sided Jessie Raspberry/Cloud Strife, SOLDIER!Aerith - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-24
Updated: 2020-11-24
Packaged: 2021-03-10 02:21:50
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,719
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27636098
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Gothams_Only_Wolf/pseuds/Gothams_Only_Wolf
Summary: SOLDIER Second Class Gainsborough falls through a ceiling and in love, all within the same day.
Relationships: Aerith Gainsborough & Angeal Hewley, Aerith Gainsborough & Katana, Aerith Gainsborough & Kunsel, Aerith Gainsborough & Reno, Aerith Gainsborough & Rude, Aerith Gainsborough & Sephiroth, Aerith Gainsborough & Tseng, Aerith Gainsborough/Cloud Strife, Zack Fair & Aerith Gainsborough
Series: Battleship Cloud [7]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1663960
Comments: 14
Kudos: 45
Collections: 2020 FF7 Secret Santa





	Can You Hear the Planet Sing?

**Author's Note:**

  * For [GoneGravitas (AntiGravitas)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/AntiGravitas/gifts).



> So, I'm so pleased this year because the Muses are absolutely roaring~ 
> 
> This one just spilled from my fingers and I thoroughly enjoyed it!
> 
> _A Note: Cloud is the same age as Aerith here, which is legal age._  
> 

* * *

"Did something happen?" Aerith groaned as she made her way back to consciousness, stunned to find a pair of bright blue eyes hanging over her. 

"Helllloooo~" 

"Dad?" 

The figure, because Aerith was the last person to offend, was leaning over her with a strip of canvas in their hair. "Hell-Oh. Good." 

"Is this... The Promised Land?" 

The figure shook their head. "Hnn, not really. Just some old church in the slums." 

"Are you an Angel?" She blurted, mostly because of Zack. She'd have to stop hanging out with him if she wanted her Big Brother to keep her by his side. 

"Ha, it would've been better for me if I _had_ been named that. I'm Cloud. You came falling down and well, you landed in my flowers." Cloud looked at her wryly, said, "I'm also a man but the hair fools a lot of people." 

"Oh. I wasn't-" 

"Trying to make assumptions? Thank you for that." Cloud admitted with a faint smile. "Now, could you get out of my flowers without damaging them any further?" 

Aerith gasped at the sight of the lilies, and then carefully stood and hopped onto the church floor from her spot, sending bruised flower petals flying into the air. 

"These..." she knelt down, gently hitched her Falcion higher, and brushed her fingertips over the petals of a white lily. "They'd sell for a lot here in Midgar." 

"They would?" 

"Mmhm!" 

"Oh." Cloud rubbed at the back of his neck and Aerith smiled in encouragement. 

"Really, they have to get flown in from Kalm and Junon and Banora by special planes so these would definitely sell well." Aerith winced at the pool of destroyed flowers and said, "I could help you out?" 

"Huh? What for?" 

"Well, I destroyed your flowers," Aerith stood and scuffed her boot tip against the wood sheepishly. "I'd... like to make it up to you." 

Cloud blinked at that, blue eyes filled with disbelief. "You'd help a perfect stranger?" 

"Well, you kind of saved my life." 

"... All I did was say hello." Cloud pointed out as he stood, his blue side apron swirling the dust motes. 

Aerith stood as well, surprised that Cloud was almost her height. She _never_ stood over the other SOLDIERs; it was kind of nice to see eye-to-eye with someone. 

Aerith looked her rescuer over. He was wearing a loose denim coverall with the zippered front open to the waist, revealing a soft black knit tank. He'd rolled the sleeves up to keep them out of the way of whatever work he did. A single band of leather wrapped around his left wrist, the ties woven around it so that they wouldn't get caught. 

The apron was canted off to the left, filled with tools and scuffed to Hells and back with the amount of wear. She glanced down to see solid boots, likely a SOLDIER Third resale set. The blond hair was scraped up into a haphazard ponytail, the spikes long and waving when he turned. 

His eyes were beautiful, a blue she'd thought belonged only to SOLDIERs. "How about... a date?" 

Cloud blinked. "You're joking, right?" 

Aerith shook her head, her braid a reassuring weight. "Nope!" 

"I... Really?" Cloud looked almost hopeful, at least a little bit. 

"Of course," she smiled, adjusted her pauldrons and then held out her hand. Aerith reached for her PHS and groaned. "Maybe later though?" 

Cloud looked at her, glanced at her PHS and asked wryly, "Do you even know where you are?" 

"... No?" She ventured, slow and hesitant.

"Boy oh boy, you really are lost," Cloud huffed but offered his own hand. "You're in the Sector Five Slums." 

"Can you lead me out of here?" 

"Mmn, sure," Cloud laced their fingers and Aerith swore up and down on Holy that her hand tingled from the contact.

* * *

Cloud wove around people, hair swaying from where it was caught in a simple canvas tie. His spikes bounced as he turned to her, a small smile tugging at his lips now and again. 

"Hey, Cloud, is she your girlfriend?" One of the shopkeepers asked, the red headband of the other woman a flash of more color in the slums. 

"Huh? No, we're not like that." He corrected almost instantly even if his grip said otherwise. "I like looking, even if it is just window shopping." 

As he said it, he glanced at a ribbon and cocked his head to the side with a wistful expression.

The green ribbon was wide, thicker than the rest and was almost the same shade as her eyes. 

"Hold on, I'll be right back," she let go of his hand, "wait here." Aerith paid for the ribbon, didn't bother with a bag and held it out for him. "You wanted this one, right?" 

Cloud looked at the ribbon, looked at her face and smiled and, _oh_ , **_that's_** what Zack meant when he said people were pretty. "You're just giving it to me?" 

"Well, I owed you," 

"For saying 'hello'," he chuckled. "Put it in for me?" He sat on the bench just outside of the store so that she could reach. 

Aerith gently untied the canvas, handed it to Cloud and scooped his hair up the same way she scooped her own without a comb. "Like this?" 

"Did you make sure it's on properly? It won't fly off into the wind, will it?" Cloud questioned as she gently tugged it to be slightly tighter than her usual but not too tight. 

"Well it's okay like this right?" She hummed. 

Cloud tested it out, spinning in a circle to make sure. "Mmn, this is good. Thank you, Aerith. I promise to cherish it." He looked to the side, scuffed his boot tip against the ground, "Hey, do you still have some time?" 

"I guess but how come?" Aerith asked as her brows furrowed in confusion. 

"Would, would you want to come to the park with me?" Cloud offered, taking her hand again. 

"Oh," she paused and then brightened, "like a date?"

"Mmhmm." 

"Then let's go!" Aerith enthused as she gave Cloud's hand a soft squeeze.

* * *

"... Have you ever met a SOLDIER before?" Cloud inquired as he swung their hands back and forth on the way to the park. 

Aerith almost choked on her spit but swallowed roughly and responded, "Probably." 

Cloud looked at their hands and murmured, "I wonder if it's a happy thing." 

She mulled it over, the moments with Sephiroth, Zack and Angeal, "What do you mean?" 

"... A children's story of the hero that protects the world; some fairy tale brought to life. But that's... not normal." Cloud's thumb rubbed over her gloved hand, "I'm not quite sure but you have to do some kind of surgery, right?" 

"It seems like it." Aerith replied, knowing all of the painful methods used to acquire such a being. 

"I think being normal is the greatest happiness," he asserted, "Somehow, SOLDIERs seem weird."

She was miffed by that, snipping like Genesis with, "I see, weird huh?" 

"Kinda scary too. They like fighting." He continued. 

Aerith pulled her hand out of his, "I happen to _be_ a SOLDIER." 

Cloud turned to her with wide eyes, "oh. I'm sorry." 

They stopped, some distance between them, mentally and physically.

"You're beautiful," he said quietly. 

"My face?" She blurted and damn Zack a thousand times to Ifrit's Hell. She was _so_ pulling the shaving cream prank when she got back. 

Cloud closed the gap between them, "No, it's your eyes." 

Aerith looked at him and asked, "Do you like them? Eyes filled with Mako are the sign of a SOLDIER." 

He snorted, "Oh please." 

"Hehe. If you look into them, they kind of look like the grass, don't they?" She teased as Cloud shuffled closer. 

"Well, if it's that I'm looking at, then I'm not scared at all. I at least know the ground." 

Aerith cautiously offered her hand and smiled when Cloud laced their fingers again. "It's true though, that there's nothing normal about me at all. You don't have a problem with that, do you Cloud?" 

"I wondered if today was going to be a peaceful one. Then I thought to myself, 'Today a SOLDIER will drop from the sky'." Cloud teased right back. 

"It wasn't such a bad thing, huh?" She grinned as Cloud lead her up the ladder to sit on top of the dome. 

"Mm-mm," 

Aerith's PHS went off, Sephiroth's number gliding across the display. 

"Aerith, return to the Shinra building immediately. Genesis has started his attack." 

She frowned at her brother's commanding tone but replied, "Understood." 

Sephiroth hung up after that. 

"I guess you gotta go?" Cloud prodded, digging around in his apron for a slip of crinkled paper that he offered her. "My PHS number." 

"Thank you," 

"Go on, get going. Defend your friend." He waved her off. 

"Huh?" 

"You were talking about him when you were dreaming in my flowers." 

"Oh." 

"Good luck," he said and waved as she hopped aboard the train.

* * *

Aerith wasn't able to make it down again but she texted Cloud infrequently, when she had the time. 

"Ooo, who're you teeeextinggg-Oof!" Aerith elbowed Zack as she continued to type. "Hey! I'm just curious." 

"I... met someone. Down in the slums," she scrubbed at her nose, a habit Hojo hated so she did it as much as possible. 

"Oh-ho-ho! You tell Seph yet?" 

"No!? He'd kill Cloud—" she sniped back, glancing down to see if Cloud had replied. 

"Cloud huh? Ooo. Is he‐or she, no judging here‐cute?" Zack teased.

Aerith chewed at her bottom lip, asked Cloud for a photo, and he replied with a shot of a lily. 

**Aerith: No, silly a pic of u**

_Cloud: But I'm dirty :(_

**Aerith: Please?**

Cloud sent one, the ribbon sitting high and shining in the sun. 

_Cloud: this ok?_

**Aerith: perfect**

She was totally making that her background.

"Oh, holy shit." Zack whistled low and long, attracting Angeal's attention. 

"What's going-Oh. Who's that then?" Angeal questioned as he also saw Cloud. 

"That's Cloud," Zack supplied, "Aerith's, er, significant other?" 

"He's not my boyfriend, not yet," she protested. 

"What's this about Aerith getting a boyfriend?" Kunsel butted in and Aerith snapped her PHS shut at the sound of his voice. 

"Nothing, absolutely _nothing_ ," she hissed, stalking out of the SOLDIER huddle to run right into her brother's chest. "Hi, you done for the day?" 

"Yes. What's this I hear about a boyfriend?" He said quietly. 

"Oh my gods, not you too?! Stupid SOLDIERs, stupid brothers, UGH!" Aerith made a bee-line for the elevator, tapping the Turk floor with an extra push.

* * *

"How the fuck did we miss you crashing through the ceiling, yo?" Reno scoffed as Aerith sat in the center of the Turk bullpen with a mug of coffee. 

"Genesis," she pointed out wryly. 

"Right, right, uh, so you gave Cloud that ribbon then? He's been super defensive about it." 

"Wait, wait, you're telling me ShinRa's been keeping an eye on him? What for?!" 

"Same reason we kept an eye on you until Hojo forced our hand," Tseng volunteered dryly. 

"He's—" 

_Like me_ , caught in her throat. A Cetra or at least part of one. 

"A different branch, same family type. We found him in the SOLDIER recruits before he bolted for the slums." 

"Where...?" 

"Nibelhiem;" Tseng answered, "close enough and his Mako sensitivity was as bad as yours." 

"Is... is he staying wi-with my Mom?" 

"We may have had an operative direct him." Rude snorted, sipping his own coffee. 

"Oh," she fiddled with her mug, gloved hands barely feeling the heat. "So, I shouldn't." 

"I dunno, it might fuck with Hojo, yo, so I'd stick with it." 

"But, if we're both-" 

"You're a long-lost cousin of a cousin of a cousin at this point to him. I would proceed with caution but by all means, Aerith." Katana added as he passed by with a stack of paperwork. "Besides, you lot still have to pick out Secret Shiva gifts for the ShinRa Exchange." 

"I'm going to win," she hummed. 

"Don't you always?" Rude pointed out. "You know us better than we know ourselves sometimes."

* * *

Thanks to some Turk wiggling, Aerith made it back down to the Sector Five slums, only to get her wallet stolen. 

"Hey! That's my wallet!" 

Cloud tripped the kid and shook his head, holding out his hand for the leather wallet. "Give it up, kiddo." 

"Aww but Clooooud," the girl whined. 

"Uh-uh, that's my girl's wallet you nicked, give it up," he frowned, narrowing his blue eyes at her. 

"Oh! Sorry!" She handed it over and bolted into the side paneling, practically vanishing on the spot if Aerith hadn't had SOLDIER vision. 

"Here," he folded her hand around it, smiling at her with a basket hanging off of his arm. His hair swayed in the breeze, gently tickling her exposed arm. "Can I get you something?" 

"Been selling your flowers?" She ribbed. 

"Mmhmm, above the Plate but my wagon broke so all I have is baskets." Cloud grinned, taking her hand after she tucked her wallet into her inventory. 

He tugged her along, stood her in front of the ribbon shop, handed her his basket and then vanished into the store. Cloud came back out with a pink ribbon, the same shade as the one she'd lost when the Turks had been forced to grab her. 

He tied it into her braid, something sitting in the center of it but covered by the way he'd tied it. "Something useless and something useful. You know, your red-headed friend isn't very nice to my flowers." 

"Ge-ez, did you have to tie it so tight?" She complained, cutting herself off before she could say her old friend's name. "Let's go see the flowers." 

"Mm, I have to refill anyways." Cloud took back his basket, retook her hand and then let her lead the way back to the church. 

Genesis was slumped in a corner, his fingertips gently tracing over a lily petal. His hair tips were grey and his once healthy skin had a sallow tint to it. "... Hey." 

"Hey?! HEY?! That's all you have to say for yourself, you giant jerk!?" She marched up to Genesis, planted her hands on her hips and then blew out her breath. "Do you have any idea how worried we all are?!" 

"Cloud, uh, Cloud was very informative." Gen mentioned dryly. "He also said that the two of you could fix me." 

"How?" 

"Has to do with the something useless," Cloud hummed, tapping at his ribbon. "It's not useless in the right hands." 

She wrinkled her nose as she thought about it and then— "oh. _Oh._ " 

Cloud tapped his boot against the floor three times and a Materia security trio snapped into place. 

"We both have to be touching it or at least each other? The Planet's not super clear." Aerith yanked off her gloves and gasped as the Planet came flooding back, chirping a happy welcome and look, look there's another Cetra, _here here here_. "Oh, wow, much louder now. Just hand holding, I think." 

She laced their bare fingers. 

The snap and spark that arched between them made Cloud gasp. 

"Got it." he choked out, tears forming in his eyes. Aerith sniffed and swiped at her own, the feeling of belonging almost overwhelming. "We're gonna fix you," 

"And then, godsdammit, we're tearing ShinRa apart at the roots." Aerith finished, the vindictiveness making Genesis smile. 

"Sounds like fun," he joked as they reached for him in tandem.

* * *

Cloud met Sephiroth the following morning, his dirt-crusted boots stacked neatly next to Aerith's. 

Seph looked down, Cloud looked up and then her brother slowly smiled. "So you think yourself worthy of my sister," 

"Worth? There's no worth about it, it's her choice." Cloud said, looking back at her and smiling. 

"... Hnn. I like this one better than the other fools." Seph offered bluntly. 

Aerith laughed, tweaked Cloud's ribbon and then tapped the security trio in the doorway. "Okay, enough posturing, we need to set things in motion." 

"... Agreed." Both of them replied in stereo. 

Cloud added, "Time for Hojo and ShinRa to take a very long walk off a very short pier." 

"... I'm calling dibs on Hojo." 

"You'll have to get in line." Cloud laughed, "I'm pretty sure there's an angry ex-Turk on his way."

**Author's Note:**

> Comment, complain, ect.


End file.
